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You can certainly add in some cardio, but if you do too much high intensity style cardio it may affect how long you are able to continue with your linear progression. You may find that you need to start deloading a little earlier.

Not a concern, but something to keep in mind. Low-intensity steady state can aide recovery.

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You can certainly add in some cardio, but if you do too much high intensity style cardio it may affect how long you are able to continue with your linear progression. You may find that you need to start deloading a little earlier.

Not a concern, but something to keep in mind. Low-intensity steady state can aide recovery.

Hello idle! Thanks for your input.

When you say "deloading a little earlier" do you mean to do less repetitions? I would also like to know the meaning of "low-intensity steady state".

I was thinking to do Bodycombat three times a week for approximately 45 minutes each time (and do this workout the rest of the days), is it too much? I can choose a less intensive cardio activity.

Cheers.

PS: Sorry for my English, I'm not a native speaker.

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When you get stuck during a session and you're unable to complete three sets of 5 repititions, you would generally leave the weight the same and try again. Three consecutive sessions where you are unable to get all the intended reps means you're stuck in your progress. At this point you'll want to lower the weight by 10-15% to kind of 'reset' yourself and start the linear progress (adding weight to the bar each session) again.

It's a grey area, but Bodycombat looks like it would be more towards the high-intensity side.

Low-intensity steady state is something like brisk walking or using an elliptical, rowing, cycling. Low impact for the joints, and consistent effort throughout (no huge peak exertion periods followed by rests).

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When you get stuck during a session and you're unable to complete three sets of 5 repititions, you would generally leave the weight the same and try again. Three consecutive sessions where you are unable to get all the intended reps means you're stuck in your progress. At this point you'll want to lower the weight by 10-15% to kind of 'reset' yourself and start the linear progress (adding weight to the bar each session) again.

It's a grey area, but Bodycombat looks like it would be more towards the high-intensity side.

Low-intensity steady state is something like brisk walking or using an elliptical, rowing, cycling. Low impact for the joints, and consistent effort throughout (no huge peak exertion periods followed by rests).

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Interesting question adnan. The first time I started strength training I used Stronglifts, switching to AFP. Now I've started again after a couple years hiatus (Basically starting from scratch) I'm going with AFP.

I guess you're meaning sarcoplasmic hypertrophy. I actually don't know whether you're right that increasing it, also increases strength, but I have a feeling that any strength increase is incidental, and less than if higher weight lower / lower reps were used.

One thing to think about with beginner programs is that you're learning the movements, so anything you can do to learn the movements properly is a good idea . While initial strength/fitness gains are nice, you really want to lay a foundation.

One could argue that doing 5x5 means more repetitions, and better ingrained muscle memory.

Of course the flipside of the coin is that you get more tired doing 5x5, perhaps leading to sloppier form in the later sets.

And the edge of the coin is that some think you don't learn as much about how to safely do the movement at 40% 1RM as you do at 80%.

Personally I think the 3x5 is plenty for learning the movement when you consider you're doing warm-up sets with an empty bar anyway. I guess you could always split the difference and do a 4x5?

I also think AFP is easily adapted to add some sarcoplasmic hypertrophy, simply by changing the last set to be AMRAP.

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Found myself here from a recommendation on /r/fitness. I'm thinking of starting this program and I'm wondering if there's some kind of warm up sets that I'm not seeing mentioned? Some people mentioned this taking around an hour and I can't see how that's possible without warm up sets.

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Warm-up routines are usually pretty personal, but the warm-up sets would usually follow something like Mark Rippetoe recommends for Starting Strength.

A set or two with empty bar, then a set of 5 at 60-70% of the scheduled work weight, and maybe a set of 3 at 80-90% of scheduled. You want to groove the movement with a light weight, but not burn yourself out too much. That's a balance each person needs to find themselves.

I personally enjoy using an over-warmup. Work up to a single that's ~10% above my working weight. This gets my CNS firing and my focus up, and makes the working weight feel light when I unrack it. That approach doesn't work for everyone.

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I followed Starting Strength for 7 weeks, then moved on to the Avg F'n Program for another 6. Both were very good to me. As @idle mentioned, a warm-up routine is very personal. Mine consisted of the following:

500m row (about 2.5 minutes)

Joe DeFranco's Limber 11 (not always all 11 exercises, but usually at least 8 or 9)

Some shoulder warm-up exercises/stretches

By this time I was warmed up and usually just starting to perspire a bit, which is when I would move into the power rack with the following:

A set or two with the empty bar

5 @ 40% of working weight

5 @ 60% of working weight

3 @ 80% of working weight

I'm back on 531 BBB now and doing basically the same thing. It works for me.

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Hi Danimal! It is possible, of course. The impact it has on your squats will be dependent on a few different variables, such as the intensity in which you approach the cardio and how conditioned your body is for said cardio, and also how close you are to your limits for 3x5 or 5x5 rep schemes under a linear progression.

Generally speaking, cardio is something everyone should aim for regardless of whether it impacts your gains. But if you plan it right, and keep the cardio in the aerobic phase (lower intensity), it can actually aide recovery for heavy lifting sessions. There may be a slight adjustment period where lifting performance decreases temporarily, but your body will adapt and eventually the effect should be beneficial or non-impacting.

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He has gotten married and has a little girl now, plus is busy with work. I think he's still training, but not in the same capacity. Been a long while since I've checked in with him, so I can't say for sure.

He has gotten married and has a little girl now, plus is busy with work. I think he's still training, but not in the same capacity. Been a long while since I've checked in with him, so I can't say for sure.